1. (Field of the Invention)
The present invention relates to a document processor which gains documents via networks and displays the documents.
2. (Description of the Prior Art)
In recent years, internet is rapidly widely used in response to progress of network technologies, development of standardization of various standards, drop of price of personal computers, etc. In internet, viewing of multimedia documents through networks, which is called a xe2x80x9cWorld Wide Web (WWW)xe2x80x9d, is performed widely.
Software for performing this viewing is called xe2x80x9cWWW browserxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cviewing software (viewer)xe2x80x9d (referred to as xe2x80x9cviewing softwarexe2x80x9d, hereinafter). As shown in FIG. 19, the viewing software has a configuration including a document gain means 1301, a temporary document storage means 1302, a document analysis means 1303 and a document display means 1304. The document gain means 1301 gains documents through a network from a document storage means (not shown) for storing documents composed of texts and link information on image and sound data as well as non-text data such as images and sounds. The temporary document storage means 1302 stores the documents which have been gained by the document gain means 1301. The document analysis means 1303 analyzes the documents stored in the temporary document storage means 1302 and instructs the document display means 1304 to display the documents or instructs the document gain means 1301 to gain data based on designation information on other data contained in the documents.
One concrete example of operation of the viewing software shown in FIG. 19 is described below. In this example, the document gain means 1301 gains a document 14 (FIG. 20) stored in the document storage means. The document 14 is formed by texts of 19 lines 1401 to 1419. The line 1406 contains link information on image data named xe2x80x9cFIG1.GIFxe2x80x9d, (referred to as an xe2x80x9cimage Axe2x80x9d, hereinafter), while the lines 1412, 1413 and 1414 contain link information on image data named xe2x80x9cDOT.GIFxe2x80x9d, (referred to as an xe2x80x9cimage Bxe2x80x9d, hereinafter). The document gain means 1301 gains the document 14 and the temporary document storage means 1302 stores the document 14. The document analysis means 1303 analyzes the document 14. In case the document analysis means 1303 has judged that the document 14 contains the link information on the image A and the link information on the image B, the document analysis means 1303 instructs the document gain means 1301 to gain these image data from the document storage means through the network. When the document gain means 1301 has gained the images A and B and the temporary document storage means 1302 has stored these image data, the document display means 1304 displays, by instructions from the document analysis means 1303, the previously gained document 14 together with the images A and B. The document 14 and the images A and B displayed by the document display means 1304 are conceptually shown in FIG. 21. The image B is associated with three locations of the document 14 and thus, the three images B are displayed on the screen.
Generally, since non-text data such as images is larger in size than text data, time for gaining the non-text data from the document storage means and communication cost of the non-text data become large. Hence, there are viewing softwares in which in case capacity of a communication path is small or communication cost per unit time or unit data quantity is large, only documents of texts are gained unless otherwise instructed by a user in order to minimize quantity of data gained from the document storage means. When this viewing software is employed, the document 14 is displayed as shown in FIG. 22 in which a predetermined identical graphic is displayed at each of portions corresponding to the images. In many of these viewing softwares, only when this graphic has been designated by the user, corresponding image data is gained from the document storage means and is displayed by the document display means.
However, in the above mentioned known method in which the image data is gained from the document storage means on the basis of link information on the image data and is displayed together with the previously gained document, since the image data corresponding to the whole link information is gained, the following problems (1) and (2) arise.
(1) Both images important for the user and images unimportant for the user are gained from the document storage means. Thus, if the image data includes the images unimportant for the user, time required for gaining these unimportant images and communication cost for the unimportant images are useless.
(2) Likewise, if the user has gained the images unimportant for the user, time required for displaying these unimportant images is useless.
Meanwhile, in the above described conventional method in which only the documents of the texts are usually gained so as to be displayed and one predetermined identical graphic is designated by the user so as to be displayed, the different images are displayed by the identical graphic and thus, the following inconveniences (1) and (2) are incurred.
(1) Since both the images important for the user and the images unimportant for the user are displayed by the identical graphic, the user cannot recognize which ones of the images are important for the user. Consequently, if the user has gained the image data unimportant for the user, time required for gaining the unimportant image data and communication cost for the unimportant image data are useless.
(2) Similarly, if the user has gained the images unimportant for the user, operation for gaining these unimportant images and time required for displaying the unimportant images are useless.
Accordingly, an essential object of the present invention is to provide, with a view to eliminating the above mentioned drawbacks of conventional document processors, a document processor in which at the time a document of texts has been gained, degrees of importance of data such as images and sounds are judged by their names, etc. and only data having degrees of importance higher than a predetermined degree of importance is gained from a document storage means so as to reduce gains of images and sounds, etc. unimportant for a user such that time required for gaining the data and communication cost of the data are lessened.
Another important object of the present invention is to provide a document processor in which at the time a document of texts has been gained, degrees of importance of link data on images are judged by their names and graphics are displayed in accordance with the degrees of importance so as to reduce gains of images and sounds, etc. unimportant for a user such that time required for gaining the link data and communication cost of the link data are lessened.
In order to accomplish these objects of the present invention, a document processor in which a document storage means stores link data and documents composed of texts and link information associated with the link data, according to the present invention comprises: a document gain means for gaining a specific document or a link data segment from the document storage means; a temporary document storage means for storing the specific document or the link data segment; a conditional storage means for storing degrees of importance of link data in association with attributes of the link data; a graphic producing means for producing a predetermined graphic in accordance with a degree of importance of the link data segment; a document display means for displaying texts in the specific document and the predetermined graphic; and a document display commanding means for instructing the document display means to display the texts in the specific document and the predetermined graphic simultaneously.
In accordance with the present invention, since the importance of the link data segment corresponding to each link information is judged in accordance with the link information contained in the specific document and contents of the conditional storage means and different graphics corresponding to degrees of importance, respectively are displayed by the document display means, a user can judge whether the link data segment is unimportant for the user, so that time required for gaining the unimportant link data segment and communication cost for the unimportant link data segment can be reduced.
Meanwhile, if a link data designating means instructs, by designating the predetermined graphic, the document gain means to gain the link data segment and the link data segment is displayed by the document display means, reference can be made on the document to only the link data segment judged by the user to be important.